Carried away

It seems like cabinetmaker Dennis Duhrkoop and I must have been related in some former life. Like me, he sees endless potential for reusing materials from the old house.

On more than one occasion he has been found in the storage container, searching through old doors, corbels and window trim to see what he can incorporate into the construction of the new cabinetry.

The old back porch door will be transformed into my powder room vanity. The corbels will become decorative accents connected to the hood over the stove, and the mismatched window wood is being used as siding in the kitchen island. I can hardly wait to see how it all turns out.

The reward of watching what could have been waste transformed into beauty and function is at the heart of the Reuse Everything eXperiment.

Shannon

Shannon Quimby is building a new house on Southeast Rex Street by using the pieces of an old house rather than putting a scrap of it into the landfill. She writes about the project -- called the Reuse Everything eXperiment -- each Tuesday and Thursday.